A Win For Rin
by Scarlet Reina
Summary: Rin has long been bullied for her ignorance, but the tables might turn soon... Will Rin take control of her emotions, or will they control her? Third chapter soon. I will be updating MUCH more frequently from now on, maybe a chapter a month? Leave suggestions for me - as well as criticism - I read it all. Rated T for some coarse language and mild violence, as well as mild themes.
1. Chapter 1

Rin woke up in a sweat. It slowly trickled down her face onto the sheets with a slow _drop. _Her memory came flooding back to her all at once, and the panicked as she realized the mistake she made the ill-fated night before. She slumped her shoulders and slowly rolled out of bed, making an audible _thump _as she struck the floor. She groaned and forced herself to stand up. The smell of Len's burning cooking brought her to her feet, as she wildly tried to bat away the smell as it flooded her nostrils. She had a slight notion that this would not be a day she'd be keen to remember. As she trudged downstairs, she was greeted by an unusually light and chipper Len. _A week of moving back with Len is equivalent to the most painful torture._ She almost let the words slip from her mouth, but she decided to attempt to be blissful while forcing down mouthfuls of charred wheat pancake. Next time she'd save her earnings and hire a chef...or at least someone capable of creating edible food. She slipped the singed pancake into the garbage bin, a far more suitable place for it to go. The sound of the door clicking shut resounded around the room. Rin's growling stomach almost persuaded her to eat one of the pancakes Len had so kindly left her, but she wasn't that desperate. _Not now, anyway. _As she stepped outside into the glimmering sunrise, all she could process was how terrible of a friend she was. _To Len. To Miku. To Luka. To Kaito. To Meiko. The list seemed endless. So conceited. So selfish. They want me to give, but I take. I take, and take, and take, until nothing is left. Soon it will be their friendship that is taken in return..._

Rin trudged to school, much to her mind and body's displeasure. With every step it seemed as if the gravity was stronger and stronger. Soon, tired, hungry, and angry, she relented, and turned back. _They won't miss me. No one does. I'm worthless. I'm a distrusting, ignorant, incredulous, unwanted. _She laid on the bitterly cold park bench and waited for serenity to overtake her anger. She began to drag her fingernails across the frosted dark plywood and divulged memories onto the bleak canvas. She detailed her stories and adventures with her brother and the friends she so deeply cherished. _All of it is gone. Everything. _She heard a faint bell in the distance, usually the signal of a dreary, boring, worthless day. But today it triggered something different. _Hope, and confidence. _Rin looked toward the sky with her fingers placed at her heart, and there they remained long after the bell became mute. Visions of helplessness, anger, and blame cycled through her mind, and it took all of her power to propel herself off of the bench, in which her sadness lay so clearly. She tugged at her bowed crop top, tearing up. _What if it's not fine? What if I tore out friendship apart indefinitely? _She forced a fake grin, but it only made her spiral deeper into her seemingly eternal sadness. _Some way. I will find a way. _She reassured herself halfheartedly. The memories of the past seeped in, and she couldn't take it any longer. She keeled over and began to cry.

Several hours later, Rin realized she had regained consciousness. A sizable crowd had gathered at the spot next to the bench she had toppled off of, and many of them were laughing, smirking, or documenting it. She noticed two turquoise streams near the edge of the waning crowd. Fear engulfed her as she made an attempt to conceal her face, then fled. The familiar creak of the door as it shut marked the end of her sociable life. She couldn't, in good dignity, go outside, for an eternity, it seemed. She could already seem to hear chants of _Dōkō-san, Dōkō-san, dead girl _as they echoed in her mind.

She could taste the faint trickle of blood running down her cheek. She peered through the tiny hole in the door and was greeted by an angry mob. _They all want me dead...I don't need to live any longer..._She thrust herself upstairs and fainted from the voices crowding her head.

Screaming woke her in a blur. She felt mildly hungover, and didn't remember anything...at all.

Although screams of laughter they had been, she still shuddered, frightened.

Rin creaked the door open with a push. The laughing became much more audible now, and she could even make some of it out...

_Kaito: I hate to be **(tch) **stereotypical, but what a baka._

_Luka: What a coward she is, running from things that only hurt her in her mind._

_Len:...Let's not forget about how she rejected my pancakes..._

_(Luka &amp; Kaito giggle)_

_Luka: They're your only friend in this world, huh..._

_(Len scowls)_

_(More giggling)_

_At least Len has his pancakes...who do I have left? _Rin sighed.  
She could almost taste the burnt mixture Len called pancakes. She rolled over and tried to sleep again.

She opened her eyes with a flutter. _Ugh. It tastes like...something... _Flashbacks of Len's pancakes haunted her mind. She heard complete hilarity ensure outside the door and groaned. _Damn it.__  
_

Smacking her lips together, she realized Len, Kaito, and Luka had force-fed her pancakes in her sleep. _Why..._

Cruel laughter spiraled through the door and into her room.

She could hear one more thing as anger engulfed her mind...

Len: _That'll teach her to fuck with my cooking._

Kaito: _Is it really that important?__  
_

Luka: _Just leave it alone..._

_(Suppressed laughter)_

Len:_...Do you think she should have died?__  
_

Dignity was all but forgotten as she charged through the door, nearly toppling down Len as she frantically screamed and punched the nothingness.

Dreams are confusing, as they say...


	2. Chapter 2

The group's laughter continued to echo in her head. _It was a dream. Right? Dream. ...No, nightmare._ Sitting upright, the question still went unanswered. She'd had dreams like this before...but this one seemed so...so_...real. I wonder if it...if it even **was **one...maybe I'm imagining things._ The latter wasn't uncommon for her to do, anyway, as real-life events somehow overlapped with her dreams...nightmares as well. _Maybe I should get some sleep._ Tossing and turning in the uncomfortable, awkwardly warm bed, she couldn't find a comfortable position and just gave up.  
Opening the door slowly, almost petrified of what could be found on the other side, she stepped out into the carpeted hallway. No voices, no breathing, no noises whatsoever_...it almost has a haunted feel to it._ Uncertain and morbidly scared, she took a slow step onto the first of the seemingly endless set of creaking and groaning stairs. Never in her whole life had she hated an inanimate object so much. At the bottom of the journey sat...no one. The house was completely ... ... _deserted. But why?_

Taking small steps, each one careful not to make a noise, she crept into the kitchen area. Unsurprisingly, the room still rank of Len's distasteful pancakes. _I wonder if they've been here..._

"Twelve of them make one, four of them and we've won."

_What? Who said that...and what did it mean...?_

"A legacy we will behold, through the ink and paper we fold."

_... ... ..._

All was silent.

Rin was incredibly confused now. The boundaries between reality and falsity were so thin that they were almost one. She dismissed the presence and voice as a mere figment of her mangled imagination, nothing more than a cruel mind trick.

"The first of many marks the spot,"

_What...!_

"Only once comes what we've sought."

_... ... ... _

_That voice sounds familiar...in some way...but I can't put my finger on it..._

Laughing arose from the clouded being that was her brain. Or maybe it was real. Whatever. She couldn't tell, and why even try to?

_Meanwhile ... _

"That was **hilarious! **I can't believe she fell for that. How stupid is she?"

_"I know, right!"_

(More laughter)

The voices could only be distinguished in pitch - as each one had the same vulgar tone, same evil intent as the rest.

_"Oi, what did that riddle mean, anyway?"_

An audible slapping noise came from inside the stairwell's room.

_"**HEY! **What did you do **that** for?"_

"Felt like it."

_"... ... answer my question ... ... **sigh"**_

"Oi, **that **riddle? Ha. Nothing at all. I just made it up on the spot. But it sounded cool and mysterious, didn't it?"

The voices were heard screaming profane phrases at each other, and none of them thought that the target of their trick was listening just outside their unprofessional hiding place.

The door, after a bit of tugging, opened to her grasp. The pair of figures shrouded in darkness were distinguished only by height; all other figures were unrecognizable in the stark blackness. Scrambling and panicking, the two mysterious silhouettes tried frantically to locate an escape. There wasn't one.

"**RUN!"**

She was suddenly rammed into, knocked over, and trampled upon as the laughing convicts quickly sped far away from her.

_What the ..._

There were no traces of voices, movement, or sound whatsoever. A dark and ominous feel came about the house. Her mood quickly shifted from slightly miffed and confused to legitimately concerned for her life. She moved upstairs, full of fear, to her bedroom; or, at least, what remained of it.

_WHAT!?_

Rin was always a fairly meticulous person; she spent hours on end making her every possession reflect and sparkle in the sunlight.

Her room was ravaged and torn to shreds. Entire furniture was flipped upside down, and she sat fuming in silence.

_Len..._

It was simply a distraction. The voices...they were just to bring her attention away...why would she _ever_ fall for such a simple trick...?

Sure enough, a distinguished laugh - practically a howl, was heard from outside the doorway.

_I need to take revenge...but how?_

"Hey! Hey! Oi, Sis, what's wrong?"

She realized she had been staring off at nothingness, blank-faced and with empty emotion.

_"**sigh...**Nothing...this is probably what I deserve. For that day."_

Len's blank, confused expression told her he had no idea what she was saying. Neither did she, to be honest.

"Oooohhhhkayyy...wanna go get ice cream?"

His naughty, prankster-y disposition was replaced by an unfamiliar kind an generous one. He had to be up to something. _But what? _She made a mental note to keep a close check on Len for the rest of the day, _or maybe month. Who knows. Might as well take advantage of free ice cream, though._

...

...

"Here we are."

The old shop seemed abandoned and not under good keep, hardly the sort of dazzling ice cream palace Len had so promised. She decided to enter; after all, maybe she was expecting too much from the small town, a far cry from downtown Tokyo. The doorbell rung as she swung the door open, and she whirled around to Len.

"So, what flavor do you want? They have a ton - raspberry, mint flake, chocolate cream -"

_"There's no ice cream here."_

It was true, obviously. The old building was once a grand ice cream and candy shop - - over 100 years ago.

"Oh, I guess they went out of business a few years ago. Shame."

_"Says here they closed permanently in 1911." _

Len shrugged indifferently. "Guess I was off by a bit."

_I'm almost certain eating ice cream wasn't his goal by bringing me here. But what was it?_

"Don't be so scared, sis, it's not like I'm going to kill you or anything!" Len mused, laughing at what was supposed to be a joke.

_I'm really not so sure it's a joke anymore._


End file.
